Carefully, the oldest Kingston brother places his new baby in my hold. I grin wider.
I knew he wouldn’t be able to turn down a free babysitter. He and Penny are still very much in the hot-for-each-other phase of their relationship and soon they’re going to need some time for themselves.
Penny smiles lovingly at a yawning Walker, who’s now busy propping her legs up on a foot stool. “Why don't you go take a nap, Big Man? The girls can help me with whatever I need. Your battery is gonna need to be fully charged to handle the middle of the night diaper changes in a few hours.”
After putting up a brief fight, the protective new dad eventually sulks and shuts himself in their bedroom at the end of the hall.
Still smiling, Penny shakes her head and speaks to us in a whisper. “I don’t think he’s slept a wink since the babies popped out. And he gets so damn cranky when he doesn’t get his beauty rest.”
Iris laughs when her cousin says that. “Jude is the. Exact. Same. Way.” She peeks into the paper bag and grabs a cookie. She hands the bag to Lexi.
“Cannon, too.” Lexi grins and rolls her eyes. She grabs a cookie before handing one to Penny.
“Must run in the family,” I mutter, carefully cradling Mayor as I lower onto the couch next to Iris. “Eli is a cranky turd, too.”
Okay. I pretty much just threw that out there without preamble. Oops.
“So, I guess you ran into Eli at the guesthouse, huh?” Penny asks with a cringe. She takes a nibble of her cookie then turns her attention back to her baby.
“Yes, he was there for breakfast this morning.” I feel a big pout on my face.
“Sorry,” my sister says, feeding a bite of her cookie to Baby Di. “I tried calling you last night to give you a heads-up, but I think your phone was off or something. It went straight to voicemail.”
My gut churns. Another oops.
Last night, I powered off my phone when I pulled out Eli’s dirty love letters. It’s super distracting when you’re mid-orgasm and get a phonecall from your sister or your parents. I’ve made it a habit to stay ahead of that by turning off my phone before I get down and dirty after dark.
“I forgot to plug it into my charger,” I lie, my cheeks hot from guilt.
I hate lying to my big sister but I can’t exactly say, “Oh right, I turned off my phone so I could jill off in peace to the smutty letters I’ve secretly been exchanging with the father of the kid I nanny for because that’s what I do on the nights when I’m not up until three in the morning digging around in his court files and trying to learn everything I can about the guy,” because that sounds kind of nutty, y’know?
Penny’s rocking chair halts. Her green eyes go wide. “He showed up at the hospital last night,” she tells me. “Straight out of jail. He shocked the hell out of us.”
“Yeah, Jude spent the whole night pacing after he got the call.” Iris nods and her blonde flyaways flutter around her face.
My sister looks concerned. “Cannon didn’t sleep, either. He was really anxious all night.”
Yup—my girls all caught ‘Kingston Fever’ at some point over the past two years. The result? Lexi, Iris and Penny have all ended up wifed-up by a different one of the Kingston brothers. Cupid is such an ironic bastard sometimes.
Lexi lowers her voice. “Any idea why he got out early? I thought he had a few more years in his sentence.”
Penny shrugs. “Apparently, it was because of overcrowding or something. They released him for good behavior.”
Well, that’s definitely a whole lot less sexy than my prison break fantasy. But much more plausible—and legal—I’ve got to admit.
“So, how’d this morning go? When you met Eli for the first time?” Penny asks, gently rotating the baby to latch him onto her other boob.
My gaze darts around the living room to avoid making eye contact with her nipple yet again. “Not the greatest,” I admit.
Despite the unpleasantness of my first interaction with Eli, I still feel this strange urge to cover for him. Although he was a complete jerk this morning, bad-talking him somehow feels like a betrayal. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’ve been lusting over the man for months and when we finally meet in person, he barely even acknowledged my presence.
Even still, I don’t want the girls to think he’s a monster. I’ve heard less than favorable comments around town about him over the time I’ve been living in Crescent Harbor.
Eli’s already the black sheep. But from everything I’ve learned about him through his letters and my snooping—er, research—into his case, I don’t think that’s fair. Something in his case doesn’t add up. I can’t shake the feeling.
Anyway, guilty or not, he’s still a person. A human, worthy of grace and respect.
“He’s ready to take his daughter home, but the Kingstons disagree on the timing,” I say, drastically downplaying the dining room blowup from this morning.
Iris and Lexi nod, seeming to agree with Callie’s grandparents.
Penny eyes the baby in her arms. “I couldn’t handle being apart from my children. Especially for so long. I’m sure that’s been hard on him,” she says.
“What do you think, Jessa?” Iris curls her legs up on the couch and angles herself to look at me. “You’re with Callie the most. What do you think is best?”
Wow. That’s a loaded question. I shrug. “I’m not sure. It’s going to be a difficult situation for everyone either way. Selfishly though, I’m just scared I’ll lose my job working with Callie. Eli doesn’t want a nanny,” I add, failing to hide my own disappointment. “I’m about to be out of a job, guys.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that.” Lexi—who has finally conquered Baby Di and her socks—scoffs. “He’s gonna quickly realize that he needs help. Callie’s a precocious little thing.” Di grabs at
